The Summary

• The Challenge: Sura Hagia Sophia Hotel draws guests almost entirely from outside Turkey, exactly the high-value, long-stay demand OTAs compete hardest to intermediate. Every one of those bookings routed through a third party was a booking priced, marketed and owned by someone other than Sura.
• The Strategy: a phased rollout starting with Booking Engine and CRM in 2021, then extras, upsell, abandoned cart recovery and mobile-specific offers layered on year over year, culminating in a Loyalty programme and AI Agent launched in September 2025.
• The Results: +525% direct revenue growth between 2021 and 2024, a Loyalty programme already driving close to half of 2026 direct revenue within ten months of launch, and extras/upsell attachment and abandoned cart recovery both running above the Middle East portfolio average.

About Sura Hagia Sophia Hotel

Sura Hagia Sophia Hotel is a 5-star leisure property in Istanbul, live on Profitroom since February 2021. Positioned to attract international leisure travellers to one of the world's most visited cities, its guest base is overwhelmingly international, led by the United States and United Kingdom.

The Challenge: Capturing Global Demand Directly

Hagia Sophia's guest profile, international travellers booking multi-night stays at premium rates, is precisely the demand OTAs are built to intermediate.

For a hotel with this profile, an underdeveloped direct channel does not just mean lost commission, it means ceding the guest relationship, the pricing control and the repeat-booking opportunity to a third party, stay after stay.

Matching that demand required more than a booking form. Hagia Sophia needed a direct channel with the sophistication of a global guest journey: checkout in the guest's own language and preferred payment method, a loyalty mechanism competitive with what international travellers expect from major chains, and the operational tools to recover abandoned sessions and retain modified bookings without adding staff workload.

The Strategy: A Phased, Deeping Partnership

In February 2021, Sura Hagia Sophia Hotel activated Profitroom's Booking Engine and CRM. Rather than treating the platform as a standalone booking form, the team added capability year over year: extras and upsell at checkout, abandoned cart recovery, and mobile-specific promotions, building toward the September 2025 launch of a Loyalty programme and AI Agent.

That steady build-out, rather than a single big-bang rollout, is what has allowed each new feature to compound on top of the last, five years into the partnership. The result is a hotel that has never stopped adding to its direct channel, and a 2026 that is already building on everything that came before it.

"Our guests are booking us from the other side of the world, often for the first time, so the experience has to feel right from the very first click. We didn't want a booking engine that simply processed reservations. We wanted one that helped us build lasting relationships with our guests, making it easy to recognise returning visitors, personalise their experience, and remove as much friction from the booking journey as possible. Five years in, that's exactly what we have."

  — Ömer Demir, Sales Manager, Sura Hotels

The Results: What Five Years of Compounding Looks Like

1. Direct Revenue on a Longer, Building Curve

Direct Booking Engine revenue grew +525% between 2021 and 2024, with confirmed bookings up more than 350% over the same period, growth built on repeat usage rather than a single promotional spike. Regional tourism demand softened through 2025, but the channel converted better than ever that year: August 2025 posted a 1.05% conversion rate, the best month on record. That momentum has carried straight into 2026, with Booking Engine traffic running 37.6% above the 2025 monthly average in H1, a channel still gaining pace, not one looking back at a peak.

2. A Global Guest Base, Captured Directly

Over the past two-plus years, 99.1% of Hagia Sophia's confirmed direct bookings came from international travellers, led by the US and UK, together over 40% of that demand, booking at roughly 155% higher value and staying about 85% longer than the property's domestic segment. Profitroom's role hasn't been to create this demand. It's been to give it a direct path to book, in the guest's own language and payment method, instead of defaulting to an OTA.

3. Loyalty: Immediate, Measurable Scale

Ten months after launch in September 2025, Loyalty members already account for 49.7% of Hagia Sophia's 2026 direct revenue, against a 6.19% portfolio average. Early days on volume, but the adoption speed points to a programme that resonates immediately with Hagia Sophia's repeat, high-value guests.

4. Feature Adoption Ahead of the Portfolio Average

Extras and upsell attachment sits at 25.9%, well ahead of the 18.6% Middle East portfolio average. Abandoned Cart Recovery has reclaimed 9.4% of direct GBV since 2024, also ahead of the 8.25% portfolio average, revenue won back with no added marketing spend.

Five years in, Hagia Sophia hasn't plateaued on any one feature. Each addition, from Booking Engine and CRM at day one through to Loyalty and AI Agent in 2025, has layered its own revenue stream on top of the last. That's the shape of a partnership still deepening, with 2026 already on track to build on it further.

Key Takeaway for Hoteliers

Hagia Sophia's results show what happens when a hotel's own market position is matched by a direct channel built to capture it. The international demand for Hagia Sophia did not appear because of Profitroom, it reflects years of brand-building by Sura itself.

Your brand earns the demand. The platform's job is to make sure you keep more of what it's worth.

Profitroom Products Used

• Booking Engine + Abandoned Cart Recovery
• CRM & Marketing Automation
• AI Agent
• Loyalty Program
• Extras
• Reservation Self Management